England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
Shenstone St John

The Parish

The parish of Shenstone lies in southern Staffordshire forming a stretch of the border with neighbouring Warwickshire. Shenstone is located a little over 3 miles south of the cathedral city of Lichfield and sits on and mostly west of the A5127 road which links Lichfield with Sutton Coldfield in Warwickshire. Shenstone is a much expanded settlement, early maps show the village mainly grouped around St John's church with only a minor area adjacent to the A5127. Nowadays Shenstone lines the A4127 from its crossing of the Black Brook for over a half mile whilst all between the A4127 and the railway line, and a little beyond it westwards, is now infilled making an oval elongated from north to south. Whilst Shenstone did, at one time, offer a cattle market it has never been big enough for market town status being mainly a large village. At the time of this transcript Shenstone was primarily a farming area, rich arable land in contrast to much surrounding areas of poor quality soil produced excellent cereal crops. Modern developments have expanded Shenstone, firstly the arrival of the Lichfield to Sutton Coldfield railway granted a station encouraging the growing commuting trend whilst today's M6 Toll bypasses to both north and east in its attempt to relieve congestion in the nearby Birmingham area. Shenstone is drained eastwards by the Black Brook which soon joins the River Tame at Tamworth turning north to meet the Trent and follow its long journey to the North Sea arriving through the Humber Estuary. Shenstone is sited at around 100 metres above the sea in fairly gently rolling terrain which rises westwards to local heights of 175 metres just before Brownhills to the west. Shenstone parish was extensive and curiously shaped as a "U" on its side wrapping around the tiny parish of Stonnall, covering almost 8,500 acres its size is more typical of an upland parish rather than an agricultural one, within that acreage there would have been a population of close to 1,950 parishioners. Even by Domesday times Shenstone was a large settlement, held by Earl Roger of Shrewsbury its assets of 16 ploughs, a small meadow and extensive tracts of woodland plus a mill made it a wealthy holding indeed.

The Church

St John's church sits almost centrally within the oval that Shenstone encompasses accessed northeastwards by a dead-end approach road from St John's Hill. Sadly today's church is a mid-Victorian replacement for a medieval predecessor, the remains of which can be seen within the grounds. The previous church was of the 13th century and showed the Early English Gothic styling of that century and was typically laid out with nave, chancel & western tower, excavations have also identified that the basic structure was augmented with both northern & southern transepts. Today's St John was completed in 1853 so is not the venue for these marriages. Unlike its predecessor today's church has its tower placed unusually at a northern position north of the northern aisle. The style chosen for today's church is close to that of the original being based upon styles in vogue c1300. The choice of stone, which has weathered to a very dark colour makes the church, as Pevsner puts it, "somewhat forbidding". The church's access road leaves St John's Hill almost opposite Holly Hill Road, the church, set in a parkland-like setting can be seen from St John's Hill, it ends in a small car park allowing an extended visit. The churchyard is extensive and also uncluttered allowing uninterrupted viewing from almost any aspect.